Based on the Wikipedia entry on Norio Nagayama, this chapter traces his unstable years: resignations driven by suspicion and misunderstanding, enrollment and withdrawal from the night course at Meiji University Nakano High School, failed attempts to stow away, failure to enter the Self-Defense Forces, and the series of pistol murders committed after stealing a handgun from the U.S. naval base in Yokosuka. It also notes that while Nagayama worked at the Shinjuku café Village Vanguard, Beat Takeshi worked there on the late shift, and its customers included Haruki Murakami and Masao Adachi.

June 17, 2020

When Nagayama was working as an early-shift boy at the café Village Vanguard in Shinjuku Ward, Beat Takeshi was working at the same shop as a late-shift boy.

On Norio Nagayama, from Wikipedia.
Emphasis in the text is mine.
At the live-in workplace in Moriguchi where he was employed, there was talk of promoting him to a regular employee.
However, when he obtained the family register copy required for that, the registered domicile field stated, “Yobito, Abashiri City, Hokkaido, no street number.”
Associating this with the then-famous film series “Abashiri Prison,” he misunderstood this to mean that he had been “born in Abashiri Prison.”
He also convinced himself that if he submitted the family register copy, others would surely think the same, and so he hid it without submitting it.
He then convinced himself that his employer was suspicious of this behavior.
In addition, when the employer’s son entered a university in Tokyo, he convinced himself that the son must have gone to investigate his past during his time in Tokyo.
As a result, Nagayama resigned as if fleeing on his own initiative.

With his second elder brother acting as guarantor, he studied while working at a milk delivery shop in Shinjuku Ward, and in April 1967 he entered the night course at Meiji University Nakano High School.
However, in July of the same year, he was removed from the school register due to misconduct, and he also quit the milk shop.
After that, in 1968, he hitchhiked on a regular-route truck in Atami City and headed for Kobe, attempting to stow away for a second time, but failed.
He cut his wrist aboard the ship in an attempt to commit suicide, but was returned to Yokohama.
In February of the same year, through the introduction of his third elder brother, he worked at a milk shop in Suginami Ward, and in April of the same year he re-entered Meiji University Nakano High School and was chosen as class chairman.
In May of the same year, he dropped out and returned to his hometown of Itayanagi.
After returning home, in September he took the entrance examination for the Ground Self-Defense Force in Nagano Prefecture, but failed.

On October 8, 1968, he broke into the U.S. Navy Yokosuka Base and stole a pistol and 50 rounds of ammunition.
After that, through November of the same year, he committed the series of pistol murders.
After the series of crimes, while hiding in an apartment in Nakano, he began working as a boy and in similar jobs at bars in Shinjuku’s Kabukicho.
When Nagayama was working as an early-shift boy at the café Village Vanguard in Shinjuku Ward, Beat Takeshi was working at the same shop as a late-shift boy.
Among the shop’s customers were Haruki Murakami and Masao Adachi, who later made the film “A.K.A. Serial Killer,” which followed Nagayama’s footsteps.